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Dispatches:
The Killing Zone
Sandra Jordan
Palestinian
civilians live under the threat of Israeli
Defence Force attacks
that do not discriminate between militants
and children. Israeli setlers
live in fear of suicide attacks. But it
is not only Palestinians and
Israelis who are dying. Since the Gulf war,
three Westerners have come under Israeli
army attack.
An American
peace activist was crushed to death by an
IDF bulldozer; a
British peace protester was shot in the
head by an IDF sniper and remains in
a coma; and last weekend, a British cameraman
was shot dead by the IDF.
Within hours
of arriving Sandra and Rodrigo are shot
at and tear-gassed by
Israeli troops breaking up a memorial service
for Rachel Corrie, an American
peace activist crushed by an Israeli Army
bulldozer two days before.
That sets
the tone for a five-week stay in which they
document the shooting
by Israeli troops of the British peace campaigner
Tom Hurndall, the death of
James Miller, the award-winning cameraman
who worked extensively for Channel 4, killed
as he filmed Israeli troops bulldozing Palestinian
homes, and the deaths and mutilation of
many innocent Palestinians and Israelis.
The Dispatches
team reveals what life is like in what has
become a fully
blown war zone. Their film captures the
aftermath of an Israeli missile
attack that assassinates a leader of the
deadly Hamas group. Children who
happen to be playing in the street nearby
are killed or have limbs blown
off.
They film
the aftermath of an attack in which Israeli
troops fire modified
tank shells that explode in mid air above
densely populated civilian areas
and spray thousands of razor sharp darts,
or flechettes, in an arc some 300
metres long and 90 metres wide. The team
encounters sniper fire from Israeli
watchtowers, and endures tank shelling alongside
a class of terrified school
children.
In one of
the most shocking moments in the film, Dispatches
captures
heartbreaking scenes in a Palestinian hospital
minutes after Tom Hurndall
was shot through the head, rescuing a seven-year-old
child from the line of
gunfire.
Jordan and
Vasquez also investigate the death of James
Miller, the
award-winning cameraman. They find that
eyewitnesses tell a story sharply at variance
with the official Israeli account.
Related Links
Rachel Corrie's Memorial Website
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